Abstract

Increased emphasis on K-12 engineering education, including the advent and incorporation of the NGSS in many curricula, has spurred the need for increased engineering learning opportunities for younger students. This is partic-ularly true for students from underrepresented minority populations or economically disadvantaged schools, who tradition¬ally lag behind their peers in the pursuit of STEM majors or careers. To address this deficit, we have created the Hk Maker Lab, a summer program for New York City high school students that introduces them to biomedical engineering design. The students learn the design process through a series of interactive workshops and laboratory activities. In coordination with learning the process, students apply the engineering design process to identify real-world problems and create testable prototypes. The students explore the entrepreneurial aspects of their projects, creating basic business plans. The program has been successful in creating a diverse set of program participants who have learned engineering design and created solutions to open-ended problems. This paper presents the structure of the Hk Maker Lab and preliminary assessments of the pro¬gram, providing a basic framework for those similarly interested in creating STEM education opportunities for high school students.